Trimalcyon, amazed, approached Pog to speak to him; he recoiled in fright as he saw him suddenly raise his two fists toward Heaven in a threatening manner, and heard him utter such a painful, despairing cry that there seemed nothing human in it.
“Captain Pog, what is the matter with you? What is the matter with you?” cried Trimalcyon.
“What is the matter with me!” cried Pog, in a delirium, “what is the matter with me! Then you do not know that this man who stands here before you, who roars with pain, who pushes cruelty to madness, who dreams only of blood and massacre; that this man was once blessed with all, because he was good, kind, and generous. You do not know, oh, you do not know the evil that must have been done to this man to excite in him the rage which now possesses him!”
Trimalcyon was more and more amazed at this language, which contrasted so singularly with the habitual character of Pog.
He tried to enlighten himself by carefully examining the countenance of his old comrade.
After a long silence he heard the dry, strident laugh of the pirate ring through the galley. “Eh, eh! comrade,” said Pog, in the tone of irony natural to him, “it is quite right to say that at night mad dogs bark at the moon! Have you understood one word of all the nonsense I have just uttered to you? I would have been a good actor, on my faith I would; do you not think so, comrade?”
“I have not understood much, to tell the truth, Captain Pog, except that you have not been always what you are now. We are alike in that. I was a servant in a college before being a pirate.”
Pog, without making a reply, made a gesture of his hand commanding silence. Then, listening with attention on the side next to the sea, he said: “It seems to me I hear a boat.”
“Without doubt,” said Trimalcyon.
One of the watchmen on the rambade uttered three distinct cries, the first separated from the two last by quite a long interval; the last two, however, were close together.